I'm an Orthodox Jewish Woman, ask me anything.

[Jewishbookwork]

On the thread @Israelilefty started, people were asking about Orthodox Judaism. So I am starting (another) one here. Other Orthodox Jewish women are welcome to answer too, so we have more of a range of answers.

I am Chabad Chasidic, we are very religious - I wear a wig, my husband wears black and white and we have lots of books in hebrew in our house.

And I know I'm too late, but hope @EllaDisenchanted @Jewishbookwork @jewishorthomum are all having a lovely shabbat 💐

A haredi man who couldn't afford to marry off his daughter once came to our door to ask for money (when I was living with MIL) and my Sil gave him money. At that time she was just a uni student.. We are supposed to help our fellow Jews when they need it and even the MO would see helping make a wedding to be a mitzvah..

Anyway I doubt those living in poverty are the same ones in fancy halls and where the dress is very expensive. You can do it for much cheaper but if each side has 7 siblings and 50 aunts and uncles, it's going to cost a lot. More than a very nice wedding for 50 people at a fancy hotel.

Yes I read that collecting door to door is a thing, and that people come from Israel to UK to collect money to pay for their dc's wedding. I can't honestly imagine giving 'charity' to put on a wedding party!

Put it this way, they cant cohabitate.They need to get married to live together. It may look like an extravagant party to you but it's actually just their family members and dear friends.. Who doesn't want their family to celebrate their special day. It's a culture that values marriage and having children.. Even some 'secular' but traditional Jewish people I know feel that the concept of delaying marriage and children because of money is a bit odd. And so they wouldn't begrudge helping if they could afford it and we are supposed to give charity anyway.

My SiL had 300 people at her wedding, mostly family.

I was just thinking this. They can't live together in sin as they used to quaintly put it. Here not so long ago it was rare to find anyone living together. It didn't really start happening until the sixties and then only in pockets. We'd bought a house, renovated it, went to our separate homes every night until we were married. That was in the 70s.

Oh I totally get the need to get married, but isn't there the Jewish equivalent of a finger buffet in the church hall reception? In my parents day that was totally normal, and in religious churches where cohabiting was frowned upon that would be totally normal today too.

There is a thing called a wedding gemach where you can go and borrow things for weddings. That includes a wedding dress, table cloths, chairs, fake flowers... Anything and everything that might be needed for a wedding, really! So if needed, the only major cost for a wedding could be the hall hire and catering.

A Jewish wedding always has dancing, so you need a band. If it's in the evening I don't think you can not feed people. Also in her day, my mother in law said people from the synagogue really wanted to come so needed to accommodate them too. Kosher food is really expensive, I remember looking at quotes before and kosher caterers all kinda have a set Base price, so it's not even about what you order. It's not like the regular marriage market, there are far fewer players and all the food needs to be kosher and hence supervised..

This isn't unique to the orthodox Jewish community. Indians spend far more on their weddings. My Indian colleague told me it was because back in the day a wedding was the social event of the season and you had to invite everyone in the village. I think it's the same, a PP said that weddings were the main reason why she travelled..

Yes I totally get that this isn't exclusive to Jews, it happens across all walks of life. For some reason I sort of equate Strictly Orthodox with the Amish, perhaps because they both shun the outside world and claim they want to make God their focus. Except they are on opposite ends of the spectrum materially, the Amish seek out a simple life but the SO seems to actively be so expensive and importance given to putting on a show, even if it puts you into crippling debt. It seems so odd and... cheeky? that you would accept charity for a $3k wig or a wedding band/3 course meal. But then again I'm very much in the MN camp of being horrified when people ask for money in wedding invitations!
And I have to put in the disclaimer that I don't know any SO in real life, only the few cases professionally and from what I've read online,so the impression I have might not be representative at all.

Yes I'm familiar with the gemach system, it's absolutely wonderful and something all communities should have!

Oh receiving money for weddings is very common in communal cultures. In my own culture, there was a market rate for cash gifts which was decided by how fancy the hotels is and your relationship. I remember finding an Israeli specific calculator online when I was trying to decide how much to give to my Sil for her wedding. We gave 500 gbp in addition to flights and hotels. It's little wonder she made a profit lol. My Hk colleague actually thinks 500 gbp is little, she gave £1000 for her brother's wedding

I don't think Judaism is anti materialism. . That emphasis on poverty and simple living is very Christian, Judaism doesn't have the concept of genteel poverty. I think I think it promotes family values I. E. getting married and having a lot of children. The inevitable poverty that many families end up in is because today's world and particularly the urban settings of London and New York are not calibrated to 4-7 kids. Israel has 'Swiss cost of living' and Berlin salaries so it isn't ideal for large families either (yet they have the highest birth rate in the developed world even amongst the secular population) . In a sense the weddings and wigs are the least of their problems..

In addition strictly orthodox Jewish schools want boys to ideally be full time learners, this is a legacy of the holocaust where the yeshivas and kollels were destroyed so they wanted to rebuild it. One income and 7 children is a recipe for poverty. But yet I don't think the community aims for that.

That is such an amazing concept, not only saves money but good for the environment too, as less wastage.

I don't think there's anything wrong with getting money for a wedding present, I always give. But to state 'no boxed gifts' or a poem inside the wedding is rude IMO and I could never do it. I'm absolutely pearl clutching at the idea of an online calculator, what on earth?! 😅
I don't mean Judaism is materialistic, but I would expect more religious people to have less of a focus on material things and being concerned about "keeping up" - regardless of the religion. A few of the SH bloggers speak of this issue and complain about people asking for money.

https://billauer.co.il/blog/2009/03/kamakesef-formula-algorithm-calculate-wedding-presents-amount-cheque/

I don't know if it's commonly used but I did use it and was grateful as otherwise had no idea lol.

Posted a long post and it got lost... Long story short, if I thought anyone was pre calculating what guests are giving with a calculator like that I probably would politely decline. I had a good friend who got married and after wedding breakfast bride, her DM, me and a few close friends were together. Bride's mum was listing off who gave what and when she said what I gave bride excitedly piped up "oh I only had you down for half that amount!". She massively went down in my estimation, most uncouth to go through names with amounts then comment on who gave what.
My DM would say you have to "cover your plate" and I think that isn't uncommon in her generation. I hate that attitude though, I'd rather cash was anonymous as no one should give for the sake of looking good (or even worse, to get it back) and equally no one should feel they have to give more than they can afford.

Cash gifts at weddings are very common in the U.S., at least among gentiles, in my experience. This is especially true if the couple has been living together before the wedding and doesn't need a lot of household goods.

My daughter, who is 22 and in her last of university, is getting married
this June. Despite having only 120 guests, it's going to be very expensive. Food and labor costs have increased tremendously in the last two years.

She's a devout Christian and booked a tour to Israel at the end of December. The trip was canceled after 7/10, and she was able to get all of her money back, fortunately. I'm sure she'll go at some point in the future.

It's very common in the UK too. Some cheeky people put in a twee poem with the invitation to indicate that "we already have a toaster/kettle so money please" or a gift list. In my family that is considered extremely rude and presumptious though. If you don't state anything I think people just give money, especially nowadays as most are living together anyway and have everything.

My daughter does have a gift registry because they will need household goods. And she certainly won't ask for money, but a lot of people will give cash anyway or buy a small gift from the registry and give some cash.

A twee poem asking for cash would be considered very cheeky here too, by the way. If that's what the couple wants they would discreetly make it known through family and the bridal party.

I'm happy to give money these days most couples are already living together so it makes sense. I'd hate to be called out on the amount I had paid though.

Going back to the Catholic church in Ireland my mother went to back in the fifties. Each month the priest would recite what each family had put in the plate. I thought that obscene.

Each month the priest would recite what each family had put in the plate. I thought that obscene.

It is, but I'm not surprised. In the Catholic church I grew up in, the priest would count the offering, and if he felt it wasn't enough, he'd have it passed around again for a second collection.

My understanding is that the Synagogues in my area charge a membership fee. I think that's a much better system.

Going back to the Catholic church in Ireland my mother went to back in the fifties. Each month the priest would recite what each family had put in the plate. I thought that obscene.

It was obscene. It doesn’t happen now.

Fuck. What happened to the widow’s few pence being worth more than the rich man’s gold, or whatever the parable was?

hi everyone - I’m back after Shabbat.

I'm not really sure where to start …!

I think there are different communities and standards all being mixed together. Designer anything isn’t the norm where I grew up not where I live now. I can only partially comment on communities in America; although I am aware there can culturally be pressure in some areas to live on a higher standard, it’s certainly not universal and probably location specific. Definitely less of a thing in the UK than certain communities in America.

my wedding dress was under £100, from a Gemach (we paid a bit more to have it altered and then we had to dry clean it at the end). My 2 wigs certainly did not come anywhere close to 3k, combined. Second hand wigs are becoming more and more normalized as are china wigs. I have bought a second hand bandfall wig in the past. I wore a scarf and beanies a lot as well. My full wig I’ve had over ten years, although that’s unusual.

Each community has different ways to keep costs down of weddings, e.g. takonos (I’m not sure exact translation), but a set of community rules about max standards for weddings and other events. (Designed to stop Pressure of keeping up with the jones’ …).lots of communities offer a Gemach wedding system. I.e if you choose to have a Gemach wedding, there will be a specific list of caterers and set menus you can choose, limit to numbers, limited budget for flowers with specific florists, set musician list and set list of photographers with max number of pics you can get. All of these different companies have agreed to do Gemach weddings at a lower cost and capped the service. by doing a Gemach wedding, the cost is limited and wedding standards don’t rise through peer pressure. You aren’t forced to do a Gemach wedding but the option is a very normal one. Alcohol was not a big thing, we had hardly any at the wedding and definitely no open bar.

For my daughter’s kiddish, I did it at home, I bought a balloon arch from Amazon which my nieces and nephews blew up, loads of people offered to make food, which I accepted. Paper goods and soft drinks cost and we bought I think 2 bottles whisky. All in all it really wasn’t expensive at all.

on the subject of gifts, the calculator thing is brand new to me. Norm when I got married was gift lists with obviously a range of prices, you gave what you could afford. when I got married DH was a student and working part time around uni, I was working but I got sick so was very part time, we gave gifts to the value of around £10; we couldn’t afford more 🤷‍♀️ no one ever said anything.

i don’t know what the norm is in Israel.

size of weddings is big though, immediate family for me alone (mine and DHsiblings, aunts, uncles, nieces , nephews, (some of them are married with kids too) ) is MASSIVE, not including cousins.

Yes there are membership fees. Think it pays for the rabbi, annd building costs, and sometimes burial fees. It is not obligatory to pay membership to a shul and there can be different membership options eg country membership.

AFAIK you do not have to pay to attend an orthodox shul for prayers, except at the high holidays you may have to book your seat and I think in some places pay a small amount if you are not a member. Shul stuff is not my area, and DH not home, so @Jewishbookwork @jewishorthomum please correct me if I’ve got this all wrong.

Do you ever feel overwhelmed by Purim? The people I watch always have a family 'theme' for costumes and it must add up every year with everyone needing a new costume. Also the mishloach manos (sp?) look like hard work, and again the ones I've seen that are themed are ones that I wouldn't have much interest in. Do they sit around like Easter eggs that you end up binning two months later? Does anyone think I can't really be bothered to do a theme or go all out, and just give small party bags? I know there's a requirement to give out a certain amount, how much is it?